Get yerself a hockey player

I’m feeling kinda smug right now. The internet is abuzz about the new show Heated Rivalry about a couple of young hockey players (in the Major Hockey League, lol) who meet as rookies and follow their instant attraction through the next several years.

Suddenly, the whole country is saying “Wait, should I watch hockey?”

“Should I date a hockey player?”

“Is this what hockey players are like?”

“Should I go to the boy aquarium?”

And here I am, married to this guy, who was a defenseman on our high school hockey team when we dated at 15. They went second in state that year, so this was some serious hockey. I watched him play every Friday night that season, learning a sport I had never watched in my basketball/baseball-playing family. Icing and offside and slashing, the magic of the penalty box and the danger of boarding. And after watching every Friday night game, he’d drive me home and we’d park and make out for hours in his car, tucked behind some trees in a wooded area near my house.

Cops knocked on the window twice in that stretch of time we were dating, startling us out of our romantic stupor.

But I did get to know a hockey player’s body pretty well. Well, THIS hockey player’s. And I never forgot it. Even after dating and getting to know other athlete’s bodies. Skating gives a person incredible fitness, and makes the glutes/thighs massive. Like Christmas hams, my husband likes to say.

So while the world is drooling over their first view of naked hockey bodies, I’m feeling a little “told ya so” over here. And for reference, for those familiar with the show, my husband is more of a Shane Hollander — steady, reliable, quiet, competitive in his way, and tops in his field. I highly recommend this type. He’s still attached to the game, too. After years of being a writer for various fan sites, he is now working as an official for local leagues, including rec leagues and the competitive women’s league. THAT is some great hockey, and he is back to skating regularly, which makes him profoundly happy. Me too, for that matter. He is a gorgeous skater.

Hockey players are different from athletes in other sports. Sure, they all have some form of superstition, trash talk, rivalry (heated and otherwise,) but having been around a lot of basketball players and then a lot of baseball, there’s a unique quality in hockey. They’re studious in a way the other sports aren’t. Much more physical because the sport is far more physically demanding than all other sports. They’re quick thinkers with great reflexes because the sport is so damned fast. Eye/hand coordination is off the charts. You may get some of those qualities in other sports, but not all of those qualities are present in every player on the team.

And because it originates in Canada, there’s an ethos of respect that pervades the sport. That Canadian “niceness” everybody talks about is baked into this sport. Now, are ALL Canadians nice? No. Buy me a coffee someday and I’ll tell you some stories about Canadian stupidity and cruelty that will crater your belief in mankind. But the world of hockey is shot through with that charming and genuine “boy/girl next door” wholesomeness. There’s an earnestness about the culture that is very endearing.

There are plenty of nasty stories involving hockey just as there are nasty stories in every other sport and discipline and culture. It’s not absent aggression and dominance and abuse. There are some teams I will not watch anymore because they enabled abuse of young players or accepted known and adjudicated domestic abusers among their fold. And the racism — holy hell, the racism. Every time I see a non-white player on a team, I cheer even louder, and then say a little prayer for their protection on and off the ice. But every year, there are more non-white players, and that is excellent news.

And there is a chance this show will open up minds and hearts about gay players at long last, too. The Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL) is way ahead of the NHL when it comes to visibility of non-hetero players, particularly given that two members of Montreal’s PWHL team The Victoire got married last summer. No big deal, just two adults in love–as it should be.

But the contours and flavor of the culture of this sport and the physical characteristics of its players are the subject du jour, and I am here to simply affirm what the populace is seeing. Yes, hockey. Yes, hockey players. Can recommend. 10/10 would date again. Would marry.

Do visit the Boy or Girl Aquarium at your earliest convenience. Pay attention to their mutual admiration and support, their protectiveness of each other, and the freaking speed with which they do everything — skating, passing, shooting, all of it. I’m going to snuggle up to my own player and watch a rivalry game tonight.